Now that we know who’s in the best shape of their life, who’s reported early, and who’s having visa problems, we can start to think about the minors and who’s going to end up where.
There’s an interesting dichotomy early in the 2011 Washingtion Nationals Spring Training — plenty of competition for pitchers, but supposedly less so for position players, with only LF and possibly CF up for grabs. While I’m not sure if I agree with that (particularly with Riggleman’s proclamation that Pudge Rodriguez is the starting catcher), I’ll reserve judgment until they actually play some games.
As folks have noted in the comments, the high minors (Harrisburg and Syracuse) are going to be very difficult to guess. It’s nearly a given that predicting pitchers is a fool’s errand, and looking over our watchlist, I can only honestly place six position players at Syracuse and Harrisburg. That’s Chris Marrero and Corey Brown (sorry, Peric) in New York and Steve Lombardozzi, Josh Johnson, Tyler Moore, and Derek Norris in Pennsylvania.
But I do think we can throw darts in terms of the position players in the low, full-season minors.
With that in mind, here’s my preseason gander at the Hagerstown, starters first (“B” before traditional positional abbreviations = Bench):
CA – David Freitas
1B – Mills Rogers
2B – Adrian Sanchez
SS – Jason Martinson
3B – Blake Kelso
OF – Randloph Oduber
OF – J.R. Higley
OF – Wade Moore
DH – Russell Moldenhauer
BCA – Wilfri Pena
BIF – Justino Cuevas
BIF – Michael Taylor
BOF – Justin Miller
BOF – J.R. Higley
Are there arguments to be made here? Of course there are. Moldenhauer might finally be put at 1B and Rogers could be used as a super-sub. Higley might not lose his job. Taylor might go to XST to get a little more seasoning (he turns 20 late in March). And of course the bluster about Bryce Harper opening the season in Rome on April could actually turn out to be true, but as you can see, I’m not fiddling nor is Georgia on my mind.
As always, discuss in the comments. Next up, a guess at Potomac.